Old Friends
by cosmicGlobetrotter
Summary: Highschool AU, John is one of the sorta popular guys, but ends up missing his old best friend Dave, who isnt popular. Then things happen.


Your name is John Egbert, and you're kind of a big deal. At least, people seem to think you are. You aren't exactly sure why anyone thinks that, probably just because you're on the football team (and it's because of you this school ever wins any of the games), but you guess you don't mind.

Everyone is nice to you and likes to hang out with you so that's a plus! Even if they don't really laugh at your jokes and they tune you out sometimes... But hey, that's just something friends do sometimes, right? Your friends, at least.

You did have a friend a long time ago, way before football. He would listen to everything you said and laugh at your jokes, but you haven't talked for a long time. Just at different places in life, you guess.

Man do you miss him sometimes. You'll occasionally see him in the hallway and try to give him a smile, but he doesn't seem to notice. In fact he always looks a little nervous, like you might bite him or something. Which is crazy! You'd never bite Dave. Even if you two don't talk much now, you still like to think of him as one of your best friends.

That's one of the reasons you are now heading to the spot you heard he spends his lunches after faking a puke attack to get away from your normal lunch group. It takes you a bit to find him, but when you do, you see he's all alone. He's sitting at a picnic table looking through some papers with a camera at his side. For some reason you start to feel a little nervous, but that's dumb because it's just Dave! But oh god, now he sees you, you can tell he does. No backing out now, time to do your thing Egbert. "Hey Dave! Um, long time no talk!" You laugh nervously, stopping a few feet away from him.

He looks around as if he thinks someone else is going to pop out. "Where are your friends?"

"Oh they're inside. I told them I was feeling sick so they wouldn't follow me around." You scuff your shoe on the ground nervously, kicking up some grass.

He raises an eyebrow at you. "Why?"

Why? Yeah, why John? Why lie? Why not just say you were going to hang out with an old friend? You really don't know why. "So we can catch up! Just the two of us." You smile as you walk over and look at the papers in his hands. They're pictures of all sorts of subjects. Trees, birds, random household objects all shot at an angle and with the sort of lighting that makes them museum worthy. Without even thinking, you take the pictures. "Oh wow Dave! These are awesome! Did you take these?"

Now it's his turn to look nervous and embarrassed. Well, you think he's embarrassed by the way he's refusing to look at you. "Uh, yeah."

You look through them all, wondering how he could get such cool pictures. "Wow Dave, just… I can't get over how neat these are! You should join the school paper or something! I'm sure they would love to have pictures like these on the paper and the website!" Your smile is really big now, and you're pretty sure you can see him smiling a little too as he messes with his camera.

"Thanks John."

"Can you take one of me?"

Confused he looks up at you, his eyebrows raised. "Huh?"

You roll your eyes. "Take a picture of me! Oh! Or us! Like old times." You're pretty sure you're smiling so big that your face might break, and his face is burning up like it might burst into flames. But he lifts up the camera and points it at the both of you, scooting closer. You wrap your arm around him to pull him extra close so both of you will actually make it in the shot. He tenses a bit at first but relaxes and snaps a picture, a picture of you smiling like a huge loser and him with his little half smile. Just like the pictures you two used to take for the hell of it.

After that you and Dave slowly start to hang out more. You would only hang out during lunch at first, but your friends started wondering why you were always mysteriously ill. The beans eventually had to be spilled, and they were only kind of sort of really mad that you would ditch them for Dave. But at that point you didn't really care. They still hung around you so it's not like they cared much either.

Then Dave started to come to your football games. He says it's because he wants to try to get better at action shots, but you're almost positive he also comes to cheer you on. You always wave at him and he waves back a little bit as he snaps a photo.

But now it's the final game of the season. He's off on the sideline near the cheerleaders, and you chance a glance at him just as you score the winning touchdown. You can hear everyone going nuts and can feel them crowding around you, cheering and screaming your name. But the only face you care about seeing is Dave's.

He's still standing to the side, just smiling to himself. But that's not going to do, so you shove past the crowd to get to him. Once you do, you pick him right up off the ground into a hug, and he hugs you back. And before you know it, you two are kissing, not giving a fuck who sees because all that matters right now is that you definitely have your best friend back.


End file.
